3 Simple Ways You Can Protect Your Data

If you are head up a small startup that has only just launched, you may be wondering why a cybercriminal would come anywhere near your company. The data that you keep is relatively mundane, you have minimal assets, and you don’t have a wealth of valuable customer data to steal. However, it is precisely because you are an unassuming business entity that you could be targeted. Hackers may assume that your firewall isn’t up to scratch, that you don’t maintain your technical protection or that you don’t deliver training to your staff. Take a look at these simple ways that you can protect your data.

Backup

Firstly, you will never be able to protect your business assets from the most determined hacker. With the technological advancements of the twenty first century, they will eventually be able to crack your systems and install a virus, a piece of spyware or a worm of some sort. By ensuring you backup your data every day, you can avoid disruption to your day to day activities. Without a backup, you won’t be able to fulfil orders, your customer data may be compromised, and your business will lose any integrity that it had.

Get The Basics Right

If you have staff, even if it’s only one or two employees, ensure that they are aware of your cybersecurity policy. Yes, you really should have one, and get them to sign up to the requirements of the document. By doing this, they have taken on a deeper responsibility for their own conduct online. If they are taking their laptops home at night, ensure that they cannot access your most sensitive files away from the office.

Passwords should always be at least twelve characters long and should never be based on a first pet name, the road they live on or their mother’s maiden name. Nonsensical and random patterns of numbers, letters and symbols are virtually unhackable. Refresh them every month and tell your staff to leave the dodgy looking emails alone.

Go One Better

Anyone who has access to your data should be willing to undergo an ID verification process. Netverify’s verification solutions provides real time document verification and uses facial recognition software to ensure that an individual doesn’t have to wait forty eight hours while ID is being double checked. Add to your Firewall protection and outsource elements of your cybersecurity to a specialist firm. Although your startup will never be one hundred per cent secure, you can ensure that you do everything in your power to deter the hackers.

The world of cybercriminals used to be a shadowy underground network of spotty teenagers in their bedrooms, whereas now many hackers are state sponsored and hacking is used as a weapon in cyber wars amongst nation states. Some of the best hackers in the world are also the wealthiest criminals in the world. While your startup might not be worthy of such a scheme, it’s vital that you protect your data by implementing as many security measures as possible.